From: Steve Peterson (peterson.steve@verizon.net)
Date: Mon Jun 09 2003 - 16:16:36 BST
Hi Paul, DMB,
Paul, I'm really glad you are taking on the social/intellectual distinction.
>> From chapter 13 of LILA:
>> "Third, there were moral codes that established
>> intellectual order over the
>> social order - democracy, trial by jury, freedom of
>> speech, freedom of the
>> press."
>>
>> dmb continues:
>> Everyone of the examples sited here by Pirsig
>> involves a social institution
>> of some kind for its perperuation.
>
Paul said:
> Yes, they are all principles which establish the
> dominance of intellectual patterns of value over
> social patterns of value.
>
> The institutions do not become intellectual patterns
> of value.
>DMB:
>> Clearly, it is not
>> group activity or
>> collective purpose that defines the social level.
>
>Paul: No, but they are part of the definition.
> DMB:
>> If that were true Pirsig
>> wouldn't be able to site democracy or federal laws
>> as examples of
>> intellectual values.
>
Paul said:
> Democracy and federal laws are a set of intellectual
> rules for social quality.
> 'In the MOQ, laws are a species of intellectual
>patterns that are associated with a lot of social
>authority and are slow to change.'
Paul:
> I've provided a definition of the social and
> intellectual levels and given lots of examples. What
> are your definitions, David?
Steve:
Based on the quotes you provided, clearly DMB uses different definitions of
the static levels than Pirsig does. You should know that DMB also
considers some human beings to be biological patterns of values (e.g. Lila),
others to be social patterns of value (e.g. Rigel), and still others to be
intellectual patterns of values (e.g. DMB)--also directly contradicted by
one of the quotes you cited from Lila's Child.
DMB would consider a school that teaches one set of beliefs (say, the
schools that gave Afghanistan the Taliban) to be a different type of pattern
of value than one which teaches a different set of beliefs (say, MIT). He
would consider a person who holds one set of beliefs to be a different type
of pov than one who holds different beliefs.
It is interesting to talk about what patterns of value dominate the behavior
of the people or the teaching of the school, but it doesn't make sense to me
to make a metaphysical distinction in kind between two human beings or
between two schools as we would between a dog and a scientific law or an
atom and a government.
I suspect that there is an important distinction between "being dominated
by" a particular type of pattern and actually being a particular type of
pattern that would be useful here. Also of issue would be the sorts of
things we try to classify as a pattern. For example, how do we think of a
law, a country, gravity, a family, church, and so on as a pattern of
experience instead of as a "thing"?
I'd be very interested to hear anyone else's thoughts about distinguishing
intellectual and social patterns.
Thanks,
Steve
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